Recent updates on China’s homegrown sci-fi aerospace intellectual property, the Nantianmen Project, have revealed details of multiple aerospace assets, according to the Xinhua News Agency on Tuesday. A Chinese military affairs expert said that the concepts and equipment envisioned in the project align with the key direction of future air warfare, which is the integration of air and space.
Per the revealed information of the Nantianmen Project, the Baidi aerospace fighter features full-spectrum stealth, manned-unmanned dual-mode operation, and a variable-sweep wing configuration that allows real-time aerodynamic adjustments. The 100,000-ton class Luanniao aerospace carrier measures 242 meters in length with a wingspan of 684 meters, has a maximum takeoff weight of 120,000 tons, and can carry 88 Xuannyu fighters, reported the Xinhua.
The Xuannyu unmanned air-superiority fighter is capable of operating beyond the atmosphere, armed with particle acceleration cannons, hypersonic missiles, and other weapons. The Zihuo multi-purpose vertical takeoff and landing platform has a projected speed of 700 to 800 kilometers per hour, can adapt to various environments including low gravity and thin atmosphere, and is designed for rescue missions in hazardous areas, said the report.
China Central Television (CCTV) News reported in October 2025 that the Nantianmen Project is a domestically developed aviation-themed sci-fi intellectual property. Its core concept is to build a global comprehensive strategic defense system comprising large strategic aerospace carrier platforms, aerospace fighters, and tactical mechs.
Launched in 2017, the project has so far produced 500,000 words of text and nearly 100 weapon and equipment design blueprints that can be displayed as models, reported CCTV News.
Xinhua reported on April 13 that the Nantianmen Project builds an imaginative world that integrates technology, equipment and character narratives from a Chinese perspective. The project weaves together multiple cutting-edge technologies – including hypersonic flight, dual-mode aerospace propulsion, metamaterial stealth, directed-energy weapons and AI-assisted decision-making – into a conceptual system centered on sci-fi fighter jets.
The entire equipment system of the Nantianmen Project is named after Chinese mythological figures and measured against real combat standards. The four core assets form a complete offensive-defensive closed loop, highlighting the forward-looking nature of these new-concept weapons, Song Zhongping, a Chinese military affairs expert, told the Global Times on Tuesday.
Though these imaginative designs in the Nantianmen Project remain at the conceptual stage, the cutting-edge concepts embedded in them, such as adaptive morphing and air-space integration, are providing important direction for the future development of aviation and aerospace technologies, Xinhua reported.
Song noted that as technology continues to advance, air-space integration can be seen as a key direction for future air warfare. The creativity and equipment concepts in the Nantianmen Project align with this broad trend.
Aerospace fighters like Baidi and Xuannyu can operate both within and beyond the atmosphere, and with the aerospace carrier serving as a space platform, the entire concept essentially extends the traditional notion of air superiority into “air superiority plus space superiority,” Song said.
The expert said that cutting-edge technologies have a basis in research, and sci-fi designs are rooted in real-world science. Many of these seemingly far-fetched advanced technologies: adaptive morphing, full-spectrum stealth, air-space adaptive engines, ion acceleration cannons, and other core technologies, are all within China’s domestic research and development pipeline. Although the complete systems have not yet been realized, related foundational technologies have made breakthrough progress one after another.
These hardcore concepts might eventually evolve into real combat assets safeguarding national security, Song said.
